Letter to Senator Grassley: Support Common Sense Limits on Commodity Subsidies

We the undersigned organizations are writing to express our support for your amendments to strengthen common sense subsidy limits on farm bill commodity programs. For too long, program eligibility loopholes have enabled a select number of savvy attorneys and unscrupulous businesses to thwart the will of Congress and divert farm subsidy payments to operations and absentee investors adept at farming federal programs. With our nation’s debt at $21 trillion and annual deficits exceeding $1 trillion on the horizon, we cannot afford to continue such egregious policy.

Your amendment efforts are a fiscally responsible step toward ensuring agricultural safety net programs are targeted toward individuals who rely on agricultural income and are actually involved in the day-to-day operations of running an agricultural business. Placing a hard cap on commodity program payments and closing current loopholes that benefit select businesses based on their legal organization or commodity specialization, will help Washington move away from picking winners and losers and instead treat all farmers and ranchers equally.

Your amendment efforts would also simply restate a policy that is clearly the intent of Congress. By a vote of 75 to 24 in the Senate and 230 to 194 in the House of Representatives, these common sense limits on commodity program eligibility were actually included in the 2014 farm bill. But both the farm bill conferees and then-Secretary Vilsack’s implementation of the provision eviscerated the reforms.

Adoption of your commodity program payment limit reform amendments is a necessary step toward bringing integrity and fiscal responsibility to federal farm policy. We thank you for your leadership on this critical effort.

For more information, please contact Joshua Sewell at 202.546.8500 x116, or josh@taxpayer.net.